During the early morning Tuesday, authorities in a Florida town arrived to a call and found a white male subject shot. He was still alive, and first responders airlifted him to UF Health in Jacksonville, Fla.
No arrests have been made in the case and no names have been made public, according to the Baker County Sheriff’s Office. As law enforcement investigated the shooting, complex circumstances were revealed.
At first, a call came in at approximately 12:47 a.m. to the Baker County Sheriff’s Office Communications Center. It was for a disturbance in progress on Doyle Williams Road in Sanderson, Fla., around 40 miles outside Jacksonville.
Deputies were already on their way to Doyle Williams Road when a second call from the same residence came in. That caller said a person had been shot there.
“Deputies arrived and discovered a white male subject had been shot and began to render aid,” said the sheriff’s office. “BCSO Detectives responded to the scene to investigate the circumstances of the shooting.”
At the scene, the detectives learned that the man who was shot was the husband of a woman at the scene and the father of her adult son. They also learned that there was a domestic disturbance that resulted in the first emergency call.
According to the sheriff’s office, the man was allegedly beating his wife when his son intervened to protect her. That then led to the two men having a physical altercation on the front yard of the property.
Both the son and her mother said that the man got into a vehicle and attempted to run them over with it. At that point, the son had retrieved a firearm, which he allegedly shot into the vehicle, critically injuring his father.
“We will continue the investigation, review the crime scene evidence, and collaborate with the state attorney to determine the course of action,” said the sheriff’s office. “This is an on-going investigation, and no names will be released at this time.”
While statistics for defensive gun use are hard to pin down, per The Trace, the outlet provided a figure of 70,040 in a report from last summer. According to the National Coalition on Domestic Violence, one in three women and one in four men have experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner.